This Week In The Laboratories Of Democracy

Welcome back to our weekly survey of what's goin' down in the several states where, as you know, the real work of governmentin' gets done, and where the rain man's drawin' circles, up and down the block.

As long as I am one ocean distant from all this nonsense, let us begin in New Hampshire, where a guy named Jim Rubens is volunteering to get hammered like a ten-penny nail by Jeanne Shaheen next fall, and so, apparently, he figures he might as well go down with all popguns blazing.

"The collaborative, flexible, amorphously-hierarchical American economy is shutting out ordinary men who were once the nation's breadwinners in living-wage labor and manufacturing jobs," Rubens wrote. "Because status success is more vital to the male psychology, males are falling over the edge in increasing numbers." A "collaborative" and "flexible" economy is one that has opened the door to more women working, Rubens wrote. And the nature of the changing economy has had a detrimental effect on men, including an increase in violence..."The point of this, if you read the whole thing, is that manufacturing jobs, which have been the basis for higher-wage working men during the post-World War II era have been in decline," he said. "Men are more sensitive than women to external indicators of status, which is one of the points in my book - which you might want to read so you can understand the whole point of this - and it's very important to all people, women and men, to have jobs, functions, and roles in life that are fulfilling and productive and engaging." The loss of manufacturing jobs that men often held in favor of "collaborative" jobs that favor women, Rubens said, "has increased stress in males."

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There, of course, a small nugget of truth lost amid the avalanche of horse-hockey on display here. But the loss of manufacturing jobs did not occur because of the rise of an amorphously-hierarchical American economy. It occurred because the incredibly well-defined hierarchy of the American corporate class shipped all the jobs to places where they could flexibly collaborate in the sweating of the poor people there. Anyway, I wish Mr. Rubens luck with his argument and hope he enjoys the campaign, wherein a woman who is very much interested in the external indicator of status called Being A Senator likely beats him like a cheap rug.

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Meanwhile, down in Virginia, even-money favorite Ken Cuccinelli's campaign hit a bump when a friend of his made a funny.

John Whitbeck, the chairman of Virginia's 10th Congressional District Republican Committee, started the event by noting that he is a Catholic and that those in his faith recently celebrated the new Pope. He told a lengthy joke about a tradition in which the "head of the Jewish faith goes to the Vatican and brings a ceremonial piece of paper" to the new Pontiff: WHITBECK: This time around, the Pope says, "I gotta find out what's on this piece of paper." So he actually takes it from the head of the Jewish faith, he opens it, he looks at, he closes it, he grimaces. And his Jewish counterpart says, "What what is?" And he says, "Well, that was the bill from the Last Supper." So, on that note, we're waiting for Ken Cuccinelli and he's on his way.

And so, I suspect, is Whitbeck. "The head of the Jewish faith"? And who might that be when he's at home, as they say around the backstretch here.

Meanwhile, out in Colorado, we discover that being an enemy to the franchise remains a good career move in Republican politics, and this is something to remember (again) the next time you hear that the GOP is headed for disaster just because it might not be able to muster a candidate good enough to beat Hillary Clinton. Oh, and it's going to be about guns, too.

Gessler assailed Hickenlooper for his support of stricter gun laws passed by the Democrat-controlled legislature this year and a measure that doubles renewable-energy standards for rural Colorado. "Under his administration, people are angry and divided. Many of our fellow Coloradans want to break away from Colorado," said Gessler, alluding to an effort by some northern Colorado counties to secede from the state.

Garnett said the outcome shows Gessler's emphasis on finding ineligible voters and eliminating them from the voter rolls is a waste of resources and politically motivated. "Local governments and county clerks do a really good job regulating the integrity of elections, and I'll stand by that record any day of the week," Garnett said. "We don't need state officials sending us on wild goose chases for political reasons."

Honey Badgers chasing wild geese is not an image I want to come back to very much, thank you.

Swinging back east, we alight in the great state of Michisissppi, where the Republican legislature has decided to knuckle the unemployed one more time. Because taxation is theft. Or something.

That bill would cut off unemployment benefits from people who fail a drug test as part of a job search. It would treat them as if they had turned down a suitable job while receiving unemployment checks. Jon Switalski is the top Democrat on the House Commerce Committee. He says the bill is unenforceable and only meant to score political points for Republicans. "It is a bill that is aimed at the elections in 2014 and nothing else," he says. Supporters of the bill say people who are not fit for work because of drug use should also not be considered fit for government assistance.

Of course, they do. The Die, Losers, In The Street wing of the party is very strong these days.

Crossing the big lake, we discover that it's The Children's Hour in Wisconsin, where the young Republicans find their juiceboxes bubbling over the great climate change hoax. Although what the hell they're worried about, I can't fathom. Under the absentee leadership of goggle-eyed homunculus Scott Walker, and through the actions of his pet legislature, it's plain that Wisconsin isn't falling for the fancy, fast-talking science con.

That may be overly optimistic. A recent study ranked Wisconsin 19th in the nation for clean-energy leadership, behind all four of its Midwest neighbors. Of the more than 600 bills introduced in Wisconsin's 2013-14 legislative session, none contains the terms "climate change," "greenhouse gases" or "global warming," and only a handful deal with energy policy. A mostly Democrat-backed bill calling on state facilities to generate or buy 30 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2025 has not advanced: no hearings, no committee action. Current law sets the goal at 20 percent by the end of 2011. The actual level in 2012 was 15.6 percent.

As part of a 2011 settlement in which it admitted no wrongdoing, CCA agreed to make some improvements, including more carefully monitoring staffing to ensure that records were not falsified. Corrections Corporation of America later admitted that it had reported staffing for at least 4,800 hours during which mandatory security posts were actually vacant. In his ruling Monday, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter found that CCA was continuing to leave key security posts unmanned, endangering public safety, and that "it is clear that non-compliance was far worse than the report of about 4,800 hours would lead one to believe." Carter ordered an extension of the settlement, an independent monitor and a steep fine for any misreported hours in excess of 12 per month.

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It's that opening clause that truly makes it art. CCA gets caught cheating the public and covering it up, but it admits no wrongdoing. Instead, it condescends to agree to do its very, very best not to engage in its non-wrongdoing again. Honest. There are guys doing five years for knocking over a bodega who are losing faith in our system of justice, alas.

Meanwhile, over in Pennsylvania, dead-politician-walking Tom Corbett has flipped his flop on the Affordable Care Act expansion of Medicaid in his state. But he has his own ideas about how it should be done and they're, well, just as bad as any other ideas Tom Corbett ever has had.

Some public health advocates are also skeptical about the possible negative consequences of Corbett's proposed reforms. "I definitely think that a cost-share of this amount, which might seem low for folks who have a steady income, would definitely be a barrier for low-income individuals," said Shannon Mace Heller, a Philadelphia-based public health attorney, in an interview with ThinkProgress. "Any cost-share would definitely be a deterrent on seeking medical care."..."I also think that [the job-seeking requirement] is going to be a barrier for individuals to get coverage," added Heller. "I'm not aware of any other state that has a work-search requirements just for the Medicaid benefit."

(A brief serious interlude: how much finagling the administration is willing to allow at the state level is going to be one of the more fascinating things to watch as the whole ACA comes on-line over the next couple of months. How much will the administration allow its signature policy initiative to be Republicanized in it delivery systems? Stay tuned. We now return you to our regularly scheduled wiseassery.)

While reviewing records over the summer, school district officials found an evaluation on a boy stating that the mother and sister were both HIV-positive. Administrators met Monday and notified the foster family of the children that the students could not return to school until documentation could be provided to the school proving the children were HIV-negative, according to the Disability Rights Center. The children were sent to school the next day anyway, and they were set aside until the foster parents picked them up. The superintendent allegedly told one of the foster parents that the children could no longer return to school.

It's nice that a story like this is newsworthy because it happens so rarely these days but, still...

And we finish up in Oklahoma, where the crazy comes sweeping down the plains, and where we find Blog Special Investigative Locust Correspondent Friedman Of The Plains checking up on the administration's plans to conspire with Wal Mart to disarm Americans by buying up all the bullets.

Oklahoma State Rep. Mike Ritze (R-Tulsa) says he's heard from his constituents about the long lines and the lack of ammo in several Green Country stores. He's sent letters to Walmart and Academy Sports asking why they can't keep their shelves stocked. Bill Morgan is a gun dealer from Georgia. He packed up his trailer after a weekend selling gun magazines at a Tulsa gun show. He and other store owners across the country say ammo is still hard to find. Reporter: "Is the demand still up for when they come into your shop? Morgan: "Still on ,22s and .22 mags. We've even, as a small shop, had to ration 100 rounds per customer, per day." That lack of bullets available to gun owners has state representative Mike Ritze worried.